Pakistan buries troops amid fury over NATO strike

Cargo trucks, including those carrying supplies to NATO forces in Afghanistan, are seen halted along the Pakistan-Torkham border, after it was shut down to traffic November 26, 2011. NATO helicopters attacked a military checkpoint in northwest Pakistan on Saturday, killing up to 24 troops and prompting Pakistan to shut vital supply routes for NATO troops fighting in Afghanistan, Pakistani officials said.

Pakistan today buried 24 troops killed in a NATO cross-border air raid that has pushed a crisis in relations with the United States towards rupture.

The attack was the latest perceived provocation by the United States, starting with the secret raid which killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in May, and the question is whether ties will break or whether the two sides will remain stuck in a bad marriage of convenience.

NATO helicopters and fighter jets attacked two Pakistan military outposts yesterday, killing the soldiers in what Pakistan said was an unprovoked assault.

NATO and US officials expressed regret about the deaths of the Pakistani soldiers, but the exact circumstances of the attack were unclear.

“US stabs Pakistan in the back, again,” said a headline in the Daily Times, reflecting fury over the attack in Pakistan, a regional power seen as critical to US efforts to stabilise neighbouring Afghanistan.

Pakistan stops NATO supplies after deadly raid

Student supporters of Islami Jamiat Talaba, a student wing of Jamaat-e-Islami, protest against NATO forces in front of a burning tyre in Lahore, November 26, 201


NATO helicopters and fighter jets attacked two military outposts in northwest Pakistan yesterday, killing as many as 28 troops and plunging US-Pakistan relations deeper into crisis.

Pakistan retaliated by shutting down NATO supply routes into Afghanistan, used for sending in nearly half of the alliance’s land shipments.

Islamabad also said it had ordered the United States to vacate a drone base in the country, but a senior US official said Washington had received no such request and noted that Pakistan had made similar eviction threats in the past, but did not follow through.

Afghans Say Pakistan Fired First in NATO Attack

As Pakistan's top leaders gathered Sunday to bury 24 Pakistani soldiers killed by NATO airstrike, Afghan officials said Pakistani forces fired first and challenged the Pakistani claim that the helicopter attack was ...

US drone strikes must stop, says American lawyer

A Global Hawk UAV is seen flying over an unidentified location in this US Air Force image.




Prominent international human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith was impressed by the 16-year-old boy who wanted to draw attention to civilian deaths caused by US drone strikes in Pakistan.

Tariq Aziz had volunteered to take pictures of people killed by the remotely piloted aircraft to help Stafford Smith highlight what he calls illegal killings.

Three days later, on October 31, he and his 12-year-old cousin were themselves killed by a drone missile strike in the North Waziristan region on the Afghan border, Stafford Smith said.

For the veteran lawyer, the deaths highlighted major flaws in the CIA-run drone campaign, which US officials say is invaluable in the war on militants.

“What they did to Tariq was absolutely disgusting,” he told Reuters in a telephone interview.

Gunmen storm Pakistan’s naval aviation base

Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik speaks to the media outside Mehran naval aviation base, which was attacked by militants, in Karachi May 23, 2011.


More than a dozen gunmen attacked Pakistan’s naval aviation base yesterday, blowing up an aircraft and fighting pitched gunbattles inside one of the country’s most heavily guarded military installations.

Officials said up to four people had been killed in the attack on PNS Mehran in the southern city of Karachi and that three hangars housing aircraft had been targeted. Nine explosions were reported from the base, with jet fuel tanks possibly catching fire and exploding.

Pakistan's nuclear surge exposed

Recent satellite images obtained by Fox News from the aerial imagery company GEOEYE show an expanding nuclear facility at the Khushab facility about 100 miles south of Pakistan's capital city of Islamabad.

Tensions increase in Pakistan after Nato helicopter injures two soldiers in attack on Afghan border

A Nato helicopter attacked a Pakistani army post near the Afghan border today, injuring two Pakistani soldiers in an incident that could further increase tensions following the U.S. raid that killed Osama Bin Laden, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

Nato confirmed there were helicopters flying near the Pakistani border and was investigating the reported attack.

‘There were helicopters operating in the border region, and we are aware there has been an incident,’ said Nato coalition spokesman Lt. Col. John Dorrian. ‘But we are going to have to assess the situation.’

Catch it if you can: A U.S Marine Cobra attack helicopter fires diversionary flares as it flies near Forward Operating Base Edi in the volatile Helmand Province

Fearsome: Cobra attack helicopters, like this one pictured in southern Afghanistan, are regularly used to battle the Taliban

US deepens engagement with Afghan Taliban to end war

The United States has stepped up direct talks with the Afghan Taliban for a political settlement of the 10-year-old war, the Washington Post reported today, a move analysts said earlier had been made easier with the death of Osama bin Laden.

A US representative attended at least three meetings in Qatar and Germany, including one “eight or nine days ago” with a Taliban official considered close to the group’s leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, the report said, citing an Afghan official.

It said Washington was hoping to make progress in these talks before July, when President Barack Obama announces the first troop withdrawals from Afghanistan, part of a process of handing over responsibilities to Afghan forces by 2014.

Details of Osama Bin Laden raid reveal how close mission came to failure

* Obama did not ask who shot Bin Laden after meeting SEAL Team Six
* 23 SEALs raided compound, wile others waited outside for Pakistani forces
* Weight of men and gear on Stealth Blackhawks measured to within an ounce
* Interpreter and search dog called Cairo part of raiding team
* 'Two dozen' more SEALS waited in back up Chinooks
* Element of surprise ruined after Blackhawk crashed in front yard

It was the single most important U.S. military mission of the last decade - capture or kill Osama Bin Laden.

With state of the art technology and an unparalleled level of secrecy, every part of the mission had been planned to the second.

But new details have emerged showing just how close run the fabled SEAL Team Six assault on Bin Laden's hideout was, after the plan quickly fell apart.

Adding exclusive new details to the account of the assault , officials described just how the SEAL raiders were forced to ditch a foundering helicopter right outside the elusive terrorist's door, ruining the plan for a surprise assault.

Silence: Team six have been told by their commander to remain tight lipped about the raid on Osama bin Laden's house

Caught out: Osama bin Laden's compound was filled with evidence which the SEALs scooped up before fleeing the compound

Versatile: While they are associated with sea operations, they can operate in any environment, including high altitude parachute insertion

Deadly: Navy SEALs are highly trained and well equipped elite soldiers used in the most challenging of missions

Unravelling: The Black Hawk helicopter, like the one seen here, could not cope with the unforeseen hot weather and had to land

Auspicious: Team six was selected to carry out the mission, and it is understood they will soon return to active duty in Afghanistan

Destroyed: The SEALs wasted no time blowing up the helicopter during the mission

Pakistan Suicide Bombs to Avenge Bin Laden - Osama sons say US violated international law

Bombers take bin Laden revenge in Pakistan

Victims of the bombing being transported to hospitals May 13, 2011.

Suicide bombers killed 80 people at a Pakistani paramilitary academy yesterday in revenge for the death of Osama bin Laden in a US raid and militants in Pakistan vowed to carry out more attacks.

A member of the Pakistani parliament said Lieutenant-General Ahmad Shuja Pasha, Pakistan’s spy chief, said he was “ready to resign” over the bin Laden affair that has embarrassed the nation. Pakistan’s opposition leader accused the Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, spy agency of negligence and incompetence.

Followers of bin Laden have vowed revenge for the al Qaeda chief’s death and the Pakistani Taliban said Friday’s attack by two suicide bombers in the northwestern town of Charsadda was their first taste of vengeance.

“There will be more,” militant spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

The bombers struck as recruits were going on leave and 65 of them were among the 80 dead. Pools of blood strewn with soldiers’ caps and shoes lay on the road outside the academy as the wounded, looking dazed with parts of their clothes ripped away by shrapnel, were loaded into trucks.

Under fire, Pakistan’s PM to address nation on bin Laden’s death

Political rivals took aim at Pakistan’s leaders today over the killing of Osama bin Laden, compounding US pressure over the al Qaeda leader’s hideout, as the prime minister prepared to address parliament on the crisis for the first time.

Pakistan’s main opposition party is stepping up calls for the prime minister and president to resign over the breach of sovereignty by US special forces who slipped in from Afghanistan to storm the compound where bin Laden was holed up.

“We want resignations, not half-baked explanations,” an official of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League told the News daily.

Iraq’s Qaeda pledges support to Zawahri, vows attacks

Al Qaeda’s second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahri speaks in this file video footage released on April 29, 2006.

An al Qaeda-linked militant group in Iraq pledged support to the organisation’s second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahri, and vowed more revenge attacks for the death of Osama bin Laden at the hands of US forces in Pakistan.

In a statement posted on an Islamist website forum today, the caliph of the Islamic State of Iraq (ISC), Abu Baker al-Baghdadi al-Husseini al-Qurashi, mourned bin Laden’s death.

“I tell our brothers in al Qaeda organisation and on the top of them Sheikh Mujahid Ayman al-Zawahri ... be merry, you have faithful men in the Islamic State of Iraq who are following the right path and will not quit or be forced out,” he said in the statement.

China hails death of bin Laden, defends partner Pakistan

A vendor sells masks of al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden in Nanjing, Jiangsu province May 3, 2011. China hailed on Tuesday the death of bin Laden in a US raid while defending its regional partner Pakistan against accusations it had done too little against terror threats

China hailed today the death of Osama bin Laden in a US raid while defending its regional partner Pakistan against accusations it had done too little against terror threats.

Beijing and Washington have gone through bouts of friction over Taiwan and Tibet, regional security and most recently China’s clampdown on dissent and human rights activists.

China showed no appetite, however, for turning the US raid that killed bin Laden on Pakistani soil into a point of dispute.

Osama Bin Laden evade capture for 6 years the charade that let him evade capture for six years

# ISI official: 'We were looking in the wrong areas. It's an intelligence failure'
# Local children received $2-3 if their ball entered the compound
# Visiting doctor asked to leave after commenting on SUVs
# CIA chief feared telling Pakistanis would 'alert targets'
# Full story of how courier unwittingly led commandos to Bin Laden's lair
# David Cameron: 'We should be tough in asking the big questions'
# Prime Minister hints at swifter troop exit from Afghanistan

Blackened: A shelter in the compound appears to have take some of the fire as U.S. forces went into to grab Bin Laden

Sightseeing: Local residents gather outside and atop the walls Bin Laden's home while the security services turn a blind eye

Pakistan anger: Demonstrators in Karachi chant slogans condemning the killing of Osama bin Laden as they gather to offer funeral prayers

Doubts: CIA Director Leon Panetta said concerns over the reliability of Pakistani intelligence led his agency not to inform them in advance of the raid

Surrounded: The three-storey lair, guarded left by security officials, is encircled by walls 12ft high topped with three lines of barbed wire. Local workers were seen carrying out running repairs after the raid

Osama bunny-laden: These are the two rabbits which Zarar Ahmed claimed were given to him by the Al Qaeda chief

It's a good day: President Barack Obama, centre, holds a Cabinet meeting with, from left, Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke, Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, and Trade Representative Ronald Kirk, in the Cabinet Room of the White House, in Washington, DC today

The wall encircles the whole compound which was raided in 2003 by security services searching for an Al Qaeda Faraj Al-Libi

Seen better days: Pakistani soldiers in a jeep pass by the compound, close to a military academy and less than 70 miles from capital Islamabad

Close up: The compound in the town of Abbottabad, Pakistan, where Osama Bin Laden was killed in the early hours of Monday morning

Young guest: Zarar Ahmed, 12, points at Bin Laden's high-security compound which he lives near to and claims to have visited several times

In 2004, a captured Al Qaeda operative told U.S. intelligence that the courier Sheikh Abu Ahmed was close to operational commander Faraj Al-Libi, left, who had replaced Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, right. 

Details of the comfortable family life Osama Bin Laden enjoyed under the noses of the Pakistani security services emerged last night.

Neighbours’ children were invited into the terror mastermind’s hideout to play with pet rabbits, while his children attended a nearby school.

Even the name of the million-dollar house was a huge clue – it was called ‘Waziristan Mansion’, after the tribal area of mountainous Pakistan where Bin Laden fled in the wake of the 9/11 outrage.

Until he was finally hunted down and killed by U.S. special forces on Sunday, the world’s most wanted man lived in the garrison city of Abbottabad with his various wives for an incredible six years.

Dramatic reconstruction of how hit squad finally took out Bin Laden

# Luxury compound was only 60 miles from Pakistan capital Islamabad
# 40 minute shootout put an end to decade long hunt for terror chief
# Bin Laden refused to surrender and was eventually shot in the head
# Body had to be carried away on foot after U.S. helicopter broke down



Almost ten years after the horror of 9/11, Osama bin Laden must have thought he was safe.

He had moved from the remote, barren mountains on Afghanistan’s inhospitable border to a comfortable $1million mansion in one of Pakistan’s most picturesque and affluent cities.

Abbottabad - named after James Abbott, the British major who founded the town in 1853 - has such a pleasant climate that it is a major hub for tourists visiting the region.

And the former home of the Gurkhas is still a major military base so locals have no reason to feel threatened.

Behind the walls of his sprawling compound about 60 miles north of the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, Bin Laden had every reason to believe he was way beyond the searching eyes of the Americans he had taunted for so long.

His family was with him and a parade of couriers would bring him everything he needed from the city outside of more than a million people.

So confident was he that the huge three-storey house he was living in was eight times larger than most other homes in the area, hardly a low-profile hideaway for the most wanted man in the world.

But, according to U.S. intelligence sources, Bin Laden was taken completely by surprise by the special forces who had spent the best part of a decade stalking him.

He had, after all, survived two wars launched with the aim of capturing him and his followers.

The last time the Americans and the British got as close - a few months after the attacks on New York and Washington - Bin Laden managed to elude them on horseback through the caves and gullies in the White Mountains of eastern Afghanistan.

For most of the past ten years, Bin Laden lived up to the nickname of 'Elvis' he had been given by the CIA because there had been so many bogus and fanciful sightings.

But as long ago as last August, President Obama was told in an intelligence briefing that there was a possible lead that Bin Laden was hiding in plain sight in Abbottabad.

It took eight months for U.S. and Pakistani agents to confirm for certain that the information was accurate.

Wanted man: Nearly 10 years after the 9/11 atrocities, a carefully planned U.S. operation led to Osama bin Laden being shot dead in Pakistan

Senior official in Pakistan’s ISI confirms bin Laden killed

Pentagon and Twin Tower hit by Al qeada force.

Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the September 11, 2001, attacks that killed almost 3,000 people and put the United States on a decade-long war footing, was killed late last night in Abbotabad by a joint American and Pakistani team, senior security officials said today.

“Yes, I can confirm that,” one senior intelligence official told Reuters, but declined to give further details.

Another security official in Peshawar confirmed it was a joint operation between CIA and Pakistani security forces.

“It was carried out on a very precise info that some high-value target is there,” he said.

Al Qaeda No.2 Zawahri most likely to succeed bin Laden

Al Qaeda's deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahri speaks in an image taken from video footage released on April 29, 2006

Egyptian-born doctor and surgeon Ayman al-Zawahri is al Qaeda's second-in-command expected to succeed Osama bin Laden following his killing in a firefight with U.S.forces in Pakistan.

Zawahri has been the brains behind bin Laden and his al Qaeda network, and at times its most public face, repeatedly denouncing the United States and its allies in video messages.

Osman Bin Laden is dead BARACK OBAMA'S WHITE HOUSE SPEECH IN FULL

Roadside Bomb Blast Kills Five in Karachi, third this week

Security officials examine a bus after it was damaged by a bomb in Karachi April 28, 2011. The roadside bomb hit the bus carrying Pakistani navy officials in the port city of Karachi on Thursday, killing three people and wounding at least seven,Taliban militants in Pakistan extended their campaign of violence Thursday against the country's security forces, targeting the navy for the third time this week with a bombing that killed five in the southern city of Karachi ...